Speaking to the Donegal News, Mr Paraig Cannon, Principal of Scoil Cholmcille in Letterkenny, said the swingeing cutbacks would have ‘huge implications’ for the pupils’ young life while the government felt it was more important to keep beleaguered banks afloat.
There are over 540 pupils at the highly popular school but due to overcrowding, authorities have had to put in two prefabricated buildings in recent years.
The school caters for a diverse range of pupils from the wider Letterkenny catchment area. The majority of classes in the school are greater than the EU average. An INTO report released earlier this week show primary schools across Donegal are among the most overcrowded in the country. Over eighty percent of primary pupils in the county are in classes greater than the EU average – twenty or more.
The INTO has described the figures as “a wake-up call” for the parents of 19,000 primary school pupils in the county in advance of the next budget.